There may be no Number Two slot in the BSP since Kanshi Ram’s illness but party general secretary Satish Mishra is probably behenji’s closest adviser at the moment. Mishra’s elevation is surprising considering that he is not a Dalit and had no political experience before he joined the party. Mishra, who comes from an eminent legal family of Allahabad, was formerly advocate general of UP and was roped in at the suggestion of the BJP to help bail out Mayawati in the Taj Corridor case. But Mishra’s political advice has turned out to be even more beneficial than his legal services. It was his brainwave that Mayawati should make a special effort to woo Brahmins and thus add to her kitty of committed SC votes. The BSP victories against the SP candidates in the UP Assembly by-elections of Aurai and Nagal is proof of this winning formula. The parties which used to consider themselves the natural choice of the Brahmins, the BJP and the Congress, were nowhere in the reckoning. The BJP managed less than 6 per cent votes in both constituencies and is licking its wounds. There will be a moratorium for some months on criticizing Nitish Kumar’s new government. Laloo believes the truth will soon be self-evident to the voters of Bihar. ‘‘Let us see how he will build the staircase to the heavens he promised. Nitish will get his wake-up call with the first budget. He will discover there is no money left for any development after paying the salaries.’’ Laloo’s point is that Bihar is a lost cause, plagued by floods, no income generated from industry and very little from agriculture. This has historically been the case but he was made the scapegoat and unfairly blamed for all the state’s woes. Missing the picture The photographers who had gathered at Amethi to take shots of the Gandhi family on the opening of the Indira Gandhi Eye Care Centre could not understand why an elegant, white-haired, foreign woman in a salwar kameez was standing next to Sonia Gandhi and her children. Most lensmen cropped the woman out of their pictures. They did not realise till much later that the unknown foreigner was, in fact, the reclusive Mrs Maino, Sonia’s mother, who now spends winters in India. Food for thought It was indeed an ironic farewell. On the very day Natwar Singh submitted his formal resignation letter, he presided over the book release of The Horseshoe Table by former under secretary at the UN Chinmaya R Gharekhan. Chapter three of the book is titled ‘‘ Iraq, WMD and Oil for Food.’’ Gharekhan was on the UN committee which conceptualised the oil-for-food programme. Also on the dais was Salman Khursheed, Natwar’s party colleague, who only a few days earlier publicly wondered why Natwar did not step down. Old secretary, new minister When Laloo was students union president at Patna University in the early ’70s, Sushil Modi was the general secretary and Ravi Shankar Prasad the assistant general secretary. Laloo was in Law School, Modi in his last year of BA and Prasad in his first year of college. Laloo used to refer to Modi and Prasad as his secretariat. Last week, Laloo bumped into Prasad in Parliament and saw that he still had his hand in a sling because of the bullet injuries sustained during the election campaign. He enquired solicitously about Prasad’s arm and offered a word of advice: ‘‘Make sure that no bugs bite the hand.’’ ‘‘Do you mean political or biological bugs’’, Prasad responded jokingly. Prasad reminded him that one arm of his secretariat had become deputy chief minister of Bihar. Laloo retorted that he had more faith in the other arm.
